Brad Sherman

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I voted for a provision that would provide funds for Iraq and Afghanistan when, under the rules governing the legislation, that funding would be tied with a specific mandate for an orderly redeployment of troops from Iraq. Today, June 19th, I voted against providing funds for the conduct of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan when such funding was not linked to such a mandate.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, I was proud to join as an original cosponsor of H.R. 6298, restricting nuclear cooperation with Saudi Arabia, authored by Congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida. However, I do not believe Congress should permanently close the door on nuclear cooperation with any state, even a state that has large petro-carbon and other energy resources, provided that the country make, as part of any agreement providing for nuclear cooperation, permanent commitments that will enhance U.S. nonproliferation goals. The Memorandum of Understanding between the United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia regarding potential nuclear cooperation could lead to the transfer of nuclear technology from the United States without such commitments on the part of the Saudis, and would otherwise not advance our nonproliferation goals. The restrictions on nuclear cooperation set forth in H.R 6298 can be modified by future legislation. Even after enactment, Congress should review any proposal by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for nuclear cooperation which contains unambiguous, permanent, enforceable and verifiable commitments by the Kingdom to prevent proliferation, including especially a binding commitment by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to never develop sensitive aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle. Nuclear cooperation is an important aspect of commercial relations between countries, and Congress must more effectively exercise its Constitutional authority in this area. The current mechanism for Congressional review of nuclear cooperation agreements laid out in Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act does not serve us well in that regard. Currently, the Administration may negotiate an agreement and put it into force simply by laying it before the Congress for 90 continuous session days. Congress, if it disapproves of a proposed ``123 Agreement'' would have to pass a resolution of disapproval, and would have to override a presumptive veto of such a resolution by a \2/ 3\rds vote. There is no reason for us to impose on Congress the requirement to achieve a super- majority in order to prevail in a dispute with the Executive Branch on an issue where Congress clearly has the Constitutional prerogative, namely international commerce (see Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3). 1 look forward to efforts to overhaul the Atomic Energy Act to require affirmative approval by Congress before a nuclear cooperation agreement can enter into force.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, on June 5, 2008, I voted for the nanotechnology bill (H.R. 5940). I have often expressed my concerns regarding the social, legal and ethical implications of ``engineered intelligence'', that is, the ongoing efforts of computer engineers and bio-engineers to create intelligence beyond that of a human being. The Congress and the Administration need to consider and address all aspects of these issues as we promote and assist the development of nanotechnology. To that end, I am pleased that this bill provides for a triennial review by the National Research Council of the adequacy of the National Nanotechnology Program's activities addressing ethical, legal, environmental, and other appropriate societal concerns, including human health concerns. I hope that these concerns will receive even further attention in the legislative process as this bill goes to Senate and as any Senate reports or conference reports on a nanotechnology bill are prepared.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. I thank the gentleman from California. Mr. Speaker, this legislation includes the text of H.R. 4246, the Defense Trade Controls Improvement Act of 2008, which was introduced by myself and Mr. Manzullo, and it is Title I, subtitle A of this bill. This subtitle grew out of hearings in our subcommittee, the Subcommittee on Terrorism Nonproliferation and Trade, which were held last July. I want to thank Chairman Berman for including the revised text of H.R. 4246 into this larger piece of legislation. I want to thank Mr. Manzullo for his efforts in crafting our original legislation, and I want to thank Mr. Ed Royce, ranking member of the Subcommittee on Terrorism Nonproliferation and Trade, for his work as well. The Defense Trade Controls Improvement Act, which is part of this larger legislation, seeks to address past performance failings and, most importantly, understaffing of the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls, the State Department agency responsible for adjudicating licenses for commercial arms sales. This agency was found to have more than 10,000 open cases at the end of 2006. Only an unsustainable winter offensive where leaves were canceled and overtime was made mandatory and people were moved in from other areas allowed this agency to reduce this huge backlog. Licenses had languished for months, not because they raised significant national security or foreign policy concerns in most cases, but because they simply sat in someone's in box unattended. Why has the State Department consistently underfunded and understaffed the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls? I believe that there is simply an institutional bias in the State Department toward work that is more highbrow, more likely to be the subject of a seminar at the Woodrow Wilson's School of Diplomacy. But this work, the work of licensing munitions exports, is of critical importance; arguably there is nothing more important done by the State Department. And Congress provides typically over $1 billion to the relevant account which can be used by the State Department for a whole variety of staffing, yet they have consistently understaffed this very important function. What the bill will do is basically add a couple of dozen licensing officers and avoid this tendency of the State Department to understaff the portion of the State Department which licenses munitions exports. Why is this licensing process so important? Well, if we say ``yes'' and issue a license and make the wrong decision, the harm is obvious. We have sent the wrong technology to the wrong country which may hurt our military or the military of our allies in the future. But there is also enormous harm if we unduly delay or wrongfully deny an application. It means we lose jobs in the United States; it means our interoperability with our allies is diminished because they won't have American munitions and therefore, won't be able to operate as effectively with our military as they could; it can rupture or hurt our relationship with allies if we wrongfully do not export or unduly delay their request to purchase American munitions, and perhaps most importantly, when we don't act quickly and people in other countries buy their munitions elsewhere, we are building the munitions industry of other countries. And what is the effect of that? More lost jobs for the United States, more losses on interoperability, and most of all, an undercutting of our policy objectives because once those munitions industries are well established in other countries, they will not be subject to any U.S.- State Department oversight and they may export to third countries things that we would not. So right now the relevant State Department agency has roughly 40 licensing officers available to adjudicate 85,000 cases expected to be received this year. This bill will beef up the staffing by the third quarter of fiscal year 2010 so that there will be one licensing officer for every 1,250 applications that are based on what we anticipate to be the workload that year. That is to say, we will go from roughly 40 licensing officers to roughly 68 licensing officers. This is hardly overstaffing. The Department of Commerce performs a similar function with regard, not to munitions, but rather, dual-use exports. The relevant part of the Department of Commerce deals with one-third as many applications that has five times the staffing. Clearly, we need those 68 licensing officers at the State Department. This bill also requires a complete strategic review of our arms export control system, a policy review that has not occurred since 9/ 11. The bill codifies the administration directives with respect to processing times for licenses with respect to export of hardware to our allies. Our exporters will have reasonable assurance that licenses will be adjudicated, not necessarily approved, but adjudicated within 60 days unless there are extenuating circumstances.

Mr. SHERMAN. This bill does not include any provisions clarifying the jurisdiction over civilian aircraft parts since the State Department has issued a proposed rule, designed to provide a bright line for those decisions. Finally, I would like to note that improvement in the operations of the State Department office have already occurred, in part in response to the hearings we held in July of 2007. I hope this bill will further improve our licensing process. It is not for us to tell the State Department that they need to have one licensing officer for every 1,250 applications is not being overly assertive. When we provide over $1 billion to the relevant account, we ought to provide some guidance as to how that money should be spent. I thank the gentleman for including our provisions in the larger bill.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, I thank the leadership for allocating 1 hour to me of floor time. As a senior member of the Foreign Affairs Committee and as Chair of the Subcommittee on Terrorism and Nonproliferation, I will take the next hour to focus on our foreign policy and to see whether it is focused correctly on the threats that face us in the first quarter of the 21st century. Then, if time permits, I will discuss an issue--some would say a threat--that will face us in the second and third quarters of the 21st century. Madam Speaker, I believe that our foreign policy has been adrift since the end of the Cold War because we have been unable and unwilling to prioritize. Our national case of ADD forces us to focus on whatever international objective flits across our consciousness. We have an enormous national ego which causes us to believe that we can simultaneously and successfully pursue all our objectives, and that we can defeat evil everywhere we choose to notice it. As a Nation, we punish politicians and pundits who dare to deflate our enormous national ego. Our bureaucracy opposes any effort to prioritize our objectives because that effort conflicts with the bureaucratic imperative to please every one of its bureaus. Imagine having to go to the Moldova desk in the State Department and say that Moldova's sovereignty over its Transdniestra region cannot be a major national priority. The State Department is pretty much on autopilot, with each of its bureaus focusing on the bureau's function, the bureau's priority, with no one setting overall national priorities. As a Nation, we have sacrificed 4,000 of our finest, and untold treasure. We did so in Iraq because our leaders told us it was necessary in order to protect ourselves from weapons of mass destruction, weapons that did not exist. But just because we are able to sacrifice treasure and lives to protect ourselves from a nuclear program that did not exist does not mean that we can sacrifice our national ego and our bureaucratic imperatives to focus on real threats that do exist. Now, in addition to these long-standing institutional and psychological barriers to prioritization, at present we face three practical barriers that also prevent us from focusing on the national threats that we should really focus on, that we should give our priority to. The first of these is our unhealthy fixation on Iraq. This fixation began with President Bush. It now afflicts us all. Now, we are told that morally we must stay in Iraq because we ``broke it,'' but we are told this by the same people who rightfully point out that whatever shape Iraq is in today and whatever shape we leave it in is still superior to where it was under Saddam. Remember, Saddam killed hundreds and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis through his policies. We're told we must stay in Iraq because we risk a humanitarian problem if we leave, while at the same time this Nation ignores actual humanitarian holocausts that are going on in places like Somalia, Chad and Congo. Those humanitarian holocausts don't count because CNN isn't there. And CNN isn't there because our troops aren't there. So our troops must stay in Iraq because CNN is in Iraq, and CNN is in Iraq because our troops are in Iraq. So we must stay there because we are there. This is no way to prioritize our foreign policy. We are told that if we leave Iraq, terrorists could meet there and plot against us. Imagine how big a national ego we must have to think that we could possibly deprive our enemies of a conference room. The fact is that terrorists can and do plot against us in Somalia, in Yemen, in countless other places, but of course these don't count because CNN isn't there. Remember, however, that 9/11 was plotted in an apartment building in Hamburg, Germany, which makes you wonder why we are staying in Iraq to make sure that terrorists don't have a place to plot against us. So our fixation with Iraq prevents us from prioritizing our foreign policy, prioritizing the need to protect Americans from nuclear attack. But that is just one of the obstacles we face. The second obstacle we face is an unhealthy fixation on our reflexive, unthinking and implacable anti-Russian attitude. Now, I don't mind being anti-Russian. I do mind being implacably, unthinkingly, and reflexively anti-Russian. Now, part of this stems from our great national hubris. Our foreign policy establishment doesn't like Mr. Putin or his so-called successor, and we don't think that we should have to accommodate anybody we don't like. The fact is that sometimes you do have to do business with people you don't like if you want to carry out a reasonable, prioritized foreign policy. Our politicians tell us that we are at war. Well, the last truly great wartime leader of the United States was President Roosevelt, and he did business with Putin's most venal predecessor. Now, this reflexive, anti-Russian attitude grew up in large part because of the individuals who are making our foreign policy decisions today. These are people who spent their lives planning and studying and writing their theses on how to surround and defeat the Soviet Union. Old habits die hard, but yesterday's priorities should not dictate tomorrow's priorities. Now, Putin has given us much to be angry about, but let us take a look at whether this new Cold War, at worst, or very cold peace, at best, started with Moscow or started in Washington. Now, one issue that has faced us throughout foreign policy is the doctrinal battle between the doctrines of self-determination and territorial integrity. Self-determination, the right of a group of people within a country to split up, split off, and form their own country; territorial integrity, the right of a nation to continue to have and to possess and to control its territory. In fact, the two great wars fought on American soil were on opposite sides of this doctrinal distinction. Our first great war on our own soil was our war for self-determination, our war for independence. The second great war was the war to protect our territorial integrity from those who sought southern independence. So we have been on both sides of this doctrinal divide. We face this same divide now, territorial integrity versus self-determination. Let us examine eight places in the general neighborhood of Russia where this doctrinal conflict has come up. You see, we are for self- determination of Kosovo just as we were for the self-determination of the Slovenes and the Croats, which led to the split up of Yugoslavia, and we were for the self-determination of the various republics that made up the Soviet Union. Four times that we were for self- determination--Kosovo, Slovenia, Croatia, and the Soviet Union itself. But we are against self-determination and instead for territorial integrity in at least four areas also close to Russia. We are against self-determination of the Transdniestra region of Moldova. We are against self-determination for the northern part of Kosovo that would like to self-determine itself out of Kosovo and rejoin Serbia. And we are against self-determination for two regions of the Republic of Georgia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Eight conflicts; four times we support self-determination, four times we support territorial integrity. Some would say we are inconsistent. This is not the case. We are consistently anti-Russian; consistently, unthinkingly, and reflexively anti-Russian. In all eight of these conflicts, Russia had a strong interest. In most of these conflicts, we had virtually no interest. Who amongst our constituents talks to us about Abkhazia or South Ossetia? Yet every time, in all eight instances, we took a very strong and determined anti-Russian position. We also have a conflict with Russia over the proposal to build a missile defense system in the Czech Republic and in Poland. Russia believes that we are rushing to install these installations to create anti-Russian facts on the ground in Eastern Europe. Our position is that those missile defenses will protect Europe from a possible Iranian nuclear-tipped missile. But the Europeans don't particularly want our missile defense system. We have to bribe the Czechs and the Poles to let us put them there. The Germans and the French would just as soon we not build them. Why are we taking this aggressively anti-Russian position? One would say that the goal is to protect Europe from Iranian nuclear weapons. But wait a minute. We have not even tried to bargain with Russia, to seek their help in preventing Iran from getting the nuclear weapons in the first place. Perhaps in return for not building a missile defense system, we could achieve greater cooperation from Moscow in stopping Iran's nuclear program. But we are unwilling to prioritize. We have as a priority creating anti-Russian facts on ground in the Czech Republic and Poland; and, accordingly, we cannot sacrifice the opportunity to build missile defense systems in those countries just to get Moscow's critical help in preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons. I could give you a number of other examples. Let me just focus on one, and that is the recent commercial disputes between Ukraine and Russia. In those disputes we have told these two groups of former Communists of these formerly Communist countries that it is wrong to sell goods, in this case, natural gas, for its fair market value. We have told former Communists that capitalism is wrong. Why? Because capitalism would allow Russia to get more for its natural gas, and our tendency to be reflexively anti-Russian exceeds our tendency to support capitalism. So we face a second practical block to prioritizing our foreign policy, and that is our instinctively anti-Russian attitude. But we also face a third block to prioritization, which is our failure to recognize how important it is to get the support of world opinion, particularly opinion in Western Europe, in order to achieve what should be our number one national priority, which is protecting the American people from nuclear weapons. Now, think back to 9/11. We had the sympathy of the whole world. People were ready to follow our leadership. People demonstrated in favor of America in places where they had not demonstrated in favor of America before or since. But then what did we do? We ignored Kyoto. We invaded Iraq. We disdained the International Court of Justice. We built Guantanamo. We angered our friends and our allies with unilateral approaches on the wrong set of issues. Today, who would say that the United States has the support or the sympathy of the world? We need to prioritize. The real threat is nuclear weapons in the wrong hands. Now, I am going to avoid using the term ``weapons of mass destruction'' because that has been a phony and misleading term. It puts nuclear weapons in the same category as chemical or biological weapons. Only nuclear weapons could kill millions of Americans. Now, I don't want this speech to be too depressing. We are vulnerable. We are institutionally and psychologically unable to focus on how to reduce our vulnerability. But we are still far safer than we have been at other times in our history. In the 1960s we faced a far greater threat. At that time we faced the risk of thousands of Soviet nuclear weapons, 10 megatons or more each. Now we face less than one five-hundredth the arsenal of the Soviet Union in terms of number and less than one five-hundredth in terms of the strength of each nuclear device. So we are far safer now than we were when we, as baby boomers, as elementary school students, were ducking under our desks in air raid drills in order to learn how to protect ourselves from a massive Soviet nuclear attack. Now, let us say that we could overcome our obstacles to a rational, prioritized foreign policy. What would be our response to the nuclear threat that we face? There are four possible responses to a nuclear threat: Prevention, deterrence, interception, and survival. I will deal briefly with the last three of these and then focus on the first, prevention. And by ``prevention'' I mean preventing the wrong people from getting the most powerful weapons. Now, deterrence and interception are, I think, false hopes because they miss the mark on the delivery system that is most likely to be used by those who wish us harm. For 20 and 30 years, we have talked on this floor about Star Wars or national missile defense, how we're going to hit a bullet with a bullet in outer space. Maybe someday it will work. But missile defense can be rendered irrelevant. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to deliver a nuclear weapon to an American city. A nuclear weapon is a bit smaller than a person, in most cases. You could smuggle one inside a bale of marijuana. Now, we have had a lot of talk on this floor about how to make our borders more secure and deal with the issue of illegal immigration. To date, our efforts have increased the fee charged by the so-called coyotes to smuggle an illegal immigrant into the United States up from $1,000 to $1,500. This may have a substantial impact on those people who aspire to work in the United States for minimum wage. But whether the cost of bringing in something the size of a person is $1,000 or $10,000 or $100,000 is not going to matter much to the Iran Revolutionary Guard Corps. We are not going to have borders so secure that a truly sophisticated terrorist group or intelligence agency will not be able to bring a bomb across our borders. Keep in mind we have 300 million legal border crossings every year. We have zero patrol officers, zero on the entire border between Alaska and Canada. Between Canada and the lower 48, we have roughly one security official every 30 or 40 miles, and that person is only working 8 hours a day. So smuggling a nuclear weapon will not be difficult for any adversary sophisticated enough to get its hands on a nuclear weapon in the first place. Not only is smuggling easier, it gives the perpetrator plausible deniability. If you send an intercontinental ballistic missile into the United States, we will know where it came from. On the other hand, if you smuggle one here, you can always deny that you did it or leave some plausible deniability, and deterrence will be undermined, and, as is obvious, interception is made irrelevant if weapons are smuggled into the United States. Now, I know that the great dictators really want an intercontinental ballistic missile. It's the Viagra of tyrants. But as a practical matter, our enemies will determine that smuggling a nuclear weapon makes more sense for them. It provides them with plausible deniability to deter deterrence. It makes irrelevant all of our missile defenses. The other problem with deterrence is that Iran may not be deterrable, and I will get to that in just a few minutes. So I have dealt with deterrence and interception. Let us turn to survival, civil defense. This is a subject you are not allowed to talk about on the House floor or anywhere else in polite society. The First Amendment protects many kinds of speech but not talking about civil defense because you have to turn to Americans and say your government may not be able to protect you from nuclear attack. We may be in a circumstance where we can reduce casualties from 200,000 down to 100,000. Our problem is that the American electorate finds the death of even 100 Americans to be unthinkable. Now, we could cut casualties in half or by more than half if we prepare civil defense. But if a nuclear weapon the size of the one tested by North Korea went off at the White House, about 2 miles away, the people in this room would survive, but none of us would know what to do or where to turn for information. Should we shelter in place? Should we flee, and if so, in what direction? We need a system to tell Americans what to do. And we have to take Americans into our confidence and tell them that this is a real threat, that we are working to reduce the threat, and that we are working to prepare for the threat. Now, I know that survival is something that we dealt with in the 1960s when we did those bomb drills I was talking about. What might have been absurd when we did it is now laughed at when it would be useful because in the 1960s, had we been hit by our adversary, it might well have been a thousand 10-megaton weapons. No one could have received medical care. There would be no relief into the city from outside the city. The living would envy the dead. In contrast, Iran might develop one or two 15-kiloton weapons, 1 to 2 percent the size of the weapons of the Soviet Union, less than 1 percent of the number. We would be able to bring in medical care from outside. We should talk about it. We should plan for it. But I know that no politician or pundit is allowed to do so; so I will stop and instead shift to a discussion of prevention, keeping nuclear weapons out of the worst hands. Now, I know that we should prevent the worst regimes and organizations from obtaining nuclear weapons. How do we do that? Maximum carrots, maximum sticks, maximum focus. We need to prioritize. We need to maximize our options. And, finally, maximum linkage, by which I mean connecting our objective of deterring a nuclear Iran or a nuclear North Korea with objectives that are important to other countries, not only North Korea and Iran themselves but Russia and China. Let's first look at North Korea. I think North Korea is less important than Iran because North Korea is not ambitious. It wishes only to survive and to oppress its people in its own territory. What we need in order to deal with North Korea is the carrot of offering a nonaggression pact, a treaty in which we would agree not to invade North Korea. That's what the North Koreans have asked for. If the North Koreans are going to get rid of their nuclear weapons, you would think at a minimum they would want a promise from the United States that we're never going to invade. Believe it or not, the American response has been no. Why? Because the neocons never want to give up their dream of invading North Korea. This has made progress at the six-party talks uncertain at best. We are unable to prioritize our need to eliminate North Korea's nuclear weapons program over the psychological need of neocons to dream of invading North Korea. Instead, we need maximum carrots for the North Korean regime if they will verifiably and permanently get rid of their entire nuclear program. We also need maximum sticks. We don't have many sticks. China has the sticks. North Korea is utterly dependent on Chinese aid, and yet we have failed to use linkage. In all our discussions with China, we have told them that our attitudes toward trade and their currency manipulation will not be affected by their attitudes on nonproliferation. We are a nation that has lost 4,000 lives to protect us from Saddam's nuclear program that did not exist, but we are unwilling to link our policy on currency values to China's behavior with regard to weapons, not weapons of mass destruction, but the real important ones, the nuclear weapons. Our State Department opposes linkage because they find it more convenient to just deal with one issue at a time in separate bureaus, in separate boxes. We need to link China's policies toward proliferation with our policies on issues important to China. Now let's turn to Iran. Iran is more dangerous than North Korea because it is ambitious. It is already responsible for terrorist attacks as far away as Buenos Aires, which is as far as you can get from Tehran. It seeks to remake the Muslim world and then the entire world. An Iran with nuclear weapons is truly dangerous. Let's go through all the different ways it imperils the United States. First, an Iran with nuclear weapons means that you can say goodbye to the nonproliferation regime which has restricted the number of nuclear states since 1945. The Gulf Cooperation Council or Saudi Arabia acting individually will certainly develop nuclear weapons if Iran does. Egypt will not be far behind. And once nuclear weapons become popular for medium-sized countries and countries that do not face existential threats to their existence, once nuclear weapons become something that every country the size of Egypt has, how do you say no to Nigeria or Brazil? Not only would we lose the nonproliferation regime, but what affect would it have on Iran's policies? Imagine terrorism with impunity. Iran is already rated by our State Department as the number one state sponsor of terrorism. Imagine what happens if Iran has nuclear weapons. It puts us in a position where we cannot respond, even if we know that Iran is responsible for terrible terrorist acts. Now not only do you provide impunity for Iran to engage in terrorism, but you put us for the first time since the end of the Cold War eyeball to eyeball with a hostile and aggressive nuclear power. You are going to end up with a Cuban missile crisis every week, or at least several a year. Whether it is IEDs smuggled from Iran into Iraq or whether it is Iranian gunboats challenging American ships in the Persian Gulf, Iran will provoke us and will test us. We will go eyeball to eyeball with a regime considerably less sane than the regime presided over by Khrushchev. Now even if we survive dozens of confrontations with a hostile nuclear Iran, there may come a day, and we pray for this day, when the Iranian Government will see itself about to be overthrown. Do you think those mullahs are going to imitate the Soviet Communists, shrug their shoulders and walk off the world stage? Gorbachev wrote a book and went on a speaking tour. Do you think that is what is going to happen? No. If these extremists in Tehran feel that they are about to be overthrown, among their options will be to use their nuclear weapons against Israel in an effort to regain popularity on the streets of Tehran or to use their weapons on the United States figuring if they are going to go out, they might as well go out with a bang. Now I know that there was that NIE, that National Intelligence Estimate, released late last year that was deliberately designed to be misread. It said that Iran had abandoned its nuclear weaponization program. But if you read that report carefully, and I am not talking about the classified version, which I wouldn't talk about here, but just the two-page unclassified version, if you read it carefully, if you read the footnote, you realize that the real bottom line in that report is that Iran is well on target to have a nuclear weapon by the middle of next decade. You see, the key difficulty in producing a nuclear weapon is to get your hands on the fissile material. And the NIE says that Iran will likely have that fissile material by the middle of next decade. Now the easier part of building a nuclear weapon is to take that fissile material and do the engineering work to turn it into a weapon. This is called ``weaponization.'' The NIE, this big national intelligence report which got headlines around the world, says that for at least a while, Iran seems to have stopped its weaponization program. But what does that mean? The weaponization program could be completed in just a year, year and a half. There is no reason for Iran to build the cart if they are still breeding the horse. All they have to do is continue to create the fissile material and then restart their weaponization program even a year or two from now and they will be well on target to have a nuclear weapon by the middle of next decade. So how do we know that they are developing the fissile material technology? Because this is the one thing the whole world agrees on. The centrifuges are turning at Natanz. Iran says so. And they brought in the IAEA to look at it, and the IAEA says so. And Bush says so. Iran's enemies and Iran's friends say so. And we have seen the pictures. Iran is creating the technology to enrich uranium and create that fissile material. Of course, Iran says it is all about generating peaceful electricity. Wait a minute. Iran, as we know, creates an awful lot of petroleum. As a byproduct of pumping petroleum, you often get natural gas. Iran has no way to export that natural gas. That natural gas is a useless byproduct. Iran flares the natural gas. Iran flares enough natural gas to generate more electricity than you could generate at ten Bushehr- style reactors. Well, if you have free flared natural gas, that is by far the cheapest way to generate electricity. But Iran isn't interested so much in generating electricity. They are interested in pursuing their nuclear program to create the fissile material which is the most essential element of creating a nuclear weapon. So Iran is developing the fissile material needed for a bomb. Now there are those who say that our response should be a military response. They point out that Saddam Hussein's real nuclear program was destroyed by Israel in 1981. Saddam put it all in one place, above ground, easy to see. Syria made a similar mistake. They put their whole program, or the essential elements of that program, all in one place, above ground. They tried to make it a little bit more difficult to see. And if news reports are to be credited, that program was destroyed late last year by an Israeli bombing effort. The Iranians are not nearly so incompetent. Their program is dispersed. It is underground. And it is hidden from our intelligence assets. A military strike would not destroy their whole program. It would set them back a few years. It would also cause a number of problems. But even if you believe that a military strike is a good idea, we ought to first exhaust our nonlethal alternatives if for nothing else than out of a decent respect for the opinion of the world. I will talk about those nonlethal alternatives in a second. But I want to respond to those who take the other approach and say, well, shouldn't we pass a law here in Congress to prohibit any bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities? That is, I think, a mistake. I call it Ambien for Ahmadinejad. It would help him sleep better. There is no reason for us to tell the Iranians that we have taken any of our options off the table. In fact, the more reasonable Iranian leaders will tell their colleagues that one of the reasons to give up the nuclear program is that in the end, it may be destroyed by an American bombing raid before it bears fruit. So you strengthen the hand of the realists in Tehran if you leave all options on the table. But now let's focus on those nonlethal options. We have got to get a message through to the Iranian elites and the Iranian people. And that message is very simple. You face total economic and diplomatic isolation unless you verifiably and permanently give up your nuclear weapons program. Well, we have the broadcasting resources to get this message through. Radio Farda is broadcasting into Iran right now. Why can't we get this message through? Because I can't lie that well in Farsi. The real facts are that Iran faces nothing close to economic or diplomatic isolation if it continues its nuclear program. They face only the tiniest sanctions, and they can do business as usual with the entire world. So what do we do to create the reality so that we can truthfully tell the Iranian people and Iranian elites that they must give up their nuclear program or they face economic and diplomatic isolation? Well, before I go forward, when we talk about the Iranian economy, we must recognize that special debt of gratitude we owe to Iran's mullahs whose mismanagement, corruption and oppression have made Tehran vulnerable to economic pressure even in a $130-a-barrel world. So what do we do? What have we done? First on the economic side, and then on the diplomatic side. Now there was great fanfare on October 21 of last year when we announced big sanctions on Iran until you realized there was virtually nothing there. The first part of that sanction was to ban four Iranian banks. We had banned some of them earlier, bringing to a total of four the number of Iranian banks that were not allowed to execute transactions with the New York branch of the United States Federal Reserve. That means large dollar transactions, including oil sales, will either have to be executed through other Iranian banks or through non-Iranian banks or priced in euros rather than dollars. The most this could possibly do is to cut maybe one-tenth of 1 percent of Iran's oil revenue at very worst. And that is if many of the European banks really hit them with huge fees. The fact is that there are plenty of banking channels. Iran can easily shift, and has shifted, to selling its oil for dollars. Instead it sells for Euros. And there are many ways that they can do dollar transactions if they want to. We have not taken the step of even banning all Iranian banks from doing business with the Federal Reserve Board because we have been unwilling to inconvenience international corporations even in that slight way. We also announced rather recently that we would put the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps on the terrorist list. And for a few hours, people said what does that mean? Does that mean that if Mercedes chooses to sell trucks to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps that the United States might shut down Mercedes operations in the United States? Two hours later, the Treasury issued a press release saying they had no intention of pursuing secondary sanctions. What that means is that every European company is free to do business with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps any way they want without facing any consequences in the United States. So what should we be doing? The good news and the bad news is that we have a lot of tools in our economic toolbox. The good news is we have got tools in the toolbox. The bad news is we have known of this threat for a decade, and we have left our tools in the toolbox, except for, you know, a little screwdriver we have used to have the slightest possible effect. The first thing we should do is follow the law. We should enforce the Iran Sanctions Act. Now, the Iran Sanctions Act was formerly known as the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act. We used the sanctions against Libya, we forced Qaddafi to change his behavior, he gave up his nuclear program, we dropped Libya from the act, we renamed the act, and we resumed our policy of never applying it against Iran. Since 1998, despite overwhelming evidence, we haven't taken the first step we are supposed to take under the Iran Sanctions Act, but what are we supposed to do? The purpose of the act is to deter companies from investing $20 million or more in the Iran oil sector. The first step in that is for us to take note of which companies have invested $20 million in the Iran oil sector, and that triggers the act. At that point, the President is supposed to impose sanctions on that firm or at least name them and shame them and then waive the sanctions. Minimum compliance with the law requires the President to at least name the companies that we know are investing $20 million or more in the Iran oil sector. What has actually happened? The State Department, the Administration, refuses to open its copy of the Wall Street Journal on any day in which there is an announcement of an additional significant investment in the Iran oil sector. I had to turn to CRS, the Congressional Research Service, to give me a chart of all of the large investments being made in the Iran oil sector. We have got not just one chart, we have got another chart. But if you ask the State Department to name even one company that is investing, they will say we refuse to speak. Why? Because they don't even want to acknowledge that the investment is being made. That would trigger the act. This is like hiring a police officer who disagrees with the law, a narcotics officer who just walks around and everybody is using whatever drugs, and this officer does nothing--what good is to pass the law if the Executive Branch refuses to apply it? Now, we have a bill that has passed this House, it's stymied by Republicans in the Senate, it is opposed by the Administration, it's called the Iran Counter-Proliferation Act. What does this legislation do? The legislation strengthens the Iran Sanctions Act, it imposes a total embargo on imports to the United States of Iran's goods. Believe it or not, we import from Iran. We don't import oil, we only import the stuff they don't need and they would have trouble selling anywhere else, caviar and carpets, et cetera. The bill we would pass through this House would at least turn to Iran and say well you can't sell those goods here in the United States, which would have a significant impact on some of the most powerful families and clans in Iran, particularly those that play a decisive role in their government. The Iran Counter-Proliferation Act would also end the obscene practice of U.S. oil companies doing business with Iran through their foreign subsidiaries. So far that bill remains bottled up, in large part because the Administration opposes it. The same Administration that refuses to enforce the existing law. What about the World Bank? The World Bank has lent some $1.36 billion to Iran since Iran began its nuclear weapons program. Some $700 million of that hasn't been disbursed yet, but the United States has done nothing to prevent those loans from being authorized or the funds disbursed, except one thing. The Administration cast a token vote at the World Bank knowing they would be outvoted, and they only did that because it was required by law. At least they followed the law. They are willing to follow the law when it's utterly inconsequential. To date, the Secretary of the Treasury has refused to even call any of his counterparts in European capitals to urge them to withdraw their support for these World Bank loans. Now, why are these World Bank loans so important? Because we know what it takes to stay in power. One of the things it takes is delivering projects to people, bringing home the bacon, if you will. Now, I know it's not kosher, it's not Halal, but it is what Iranian politicians around the world do. Imagine what it is for them to cut the ribbon on a water project and say we have given this to you. That's enough to help them stay in power just a little bit. But imagine how much more meaningful it is when they say the whole world, the World Bank, has sent us this money. This is proof that the United States can do nothing to hurt us. This is proof that the whole world is on our side about developing nuclear weapons. The World Bank loans to Iran are harmful not just from an economic perspective, they are harmful to us from a political perspective as well. We should change our laws dealing with Federal procurement, State procurement and Federal corporate assistance to achieve one thing. We should turn to any corporation seeking a big contract with the Federal Government or seeking the assistance of any of our programs designed to help business, whether it be the Export-Import Bank or a whole host of other programs. We should ask the other question, does your corporation or any of its affiliates invest in the Iran oil sector, loan money to the Iranian government, sell munitions to the Iranian government? Imagine the effect this will have if we make it clear that if you are a Nebraska corporation owned by an Italian corporation, and the Italian corporation is investing in the oil sector of Iran, that means we are not going to give you the contract, we will give it to somebody else. A number of States have tried to do this, and they have been threatened by the Federal Government. We have passed through this House, and it has made it through the Foreign Relations Committee in the Senate, a bill dealing with OPIC, the most unfortunately titled Federal agency, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, and said that if you want the assistance of this agency, you have to certify that neither your corporation nor any of its affiliates are engaging in those wrongful transactions with the Iranian government. Clearly, we should not be giving assistance to those who are aiding Iran's nuclear program or aiding the Iranian government in one of the key pressure point areas, munitions, investment in the oil sector, loans to the government. Now we have the issue of divestiture. We need to encourage private investors and government pension plans and private pension plans to sell their stock in corporations that are engaging in those transactions with the Iranian government, investments in the oil sector, loans to the government, sale of munitions. A number of States, especially the State of Florida, my own State of California, have decided to divest from such companies. But when they do so, they face frivolous lawsuits, lawsuits from people saying, ``oh, you have to invest for the maximum possible return, and you can't think of national interest when you do so.'' Now, get this, because my colleagues have seen how the Administration has been opposed to frivolous lawsuits and any lawsuit they claim is frivolous, they have been against lawsuits on everything except one thing, they are in favor of frivolous lawsuits against State governments who choose to divest, against private pension plans that choose to divest. Why? Because their hatred of trial lawyers is exceeded by their hatred of investors who would try to influence the very companies in which they have made an investment. It is absolutely shameful for us to make it more difficult for good Americans to push the companies that they partially own into doing the right thing. We should go further. Later this month, I will introduce legislation to change our tax code so that those who are divesting from companies doing business in those bad areas, as I have identified, or those areas we would like to discourage with regard to Iran, we will say, if you sell your stock in such a company, and reinvest the proceeds in a company that is clean, then you should get a carryover basis. We are not going to use that as a taxable event, because divestiture should be encouraged, not taxed. We need to turn to all the corporations in the world and say do not invest in the Iran oil sector, do not lend money to that government, do not sell the munitions, otherwise, we will encourage our companies, we will encourage our investors, we will encourage our pension plans, we will encourage our individual investors to stop investing in your company. We will not give aid to any of your subsidiaries, and we will not make them eligible for Federal contracts. This will provide real pressure on the Iranian government. But that's just the economic toolbox. We also have the diplomatic toolbox as well. It is even more powerful, it is even less used. We have never offered Russia anything in return for real cooperation on the issue of Iran's nuclear program. We have not provided linkage between issues Russia cares about and what we care about, which ought to be preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons. We have made it clear to Russia that what we do with regard to Chechnya, Abkhazia, Moldova, Estonia or anything else is not linked to what Russia does with regard to Iran. Likewise, we have made it clear to China that what we do with regard to Taiwan or currency manipulation or trade will have nothing to do with what China does in the U.N. or elsewhere with regard to Iran's nuclear program. If we could get Russia and China to support us at the U.N., then instead of stupid little sanctions designed to fool people around the world, we could get real U.N. sanctions. What would that mean? Imagine a U.N. ban on sending refined oil products into Iran. Now, Iran has plenty of petroleum, but they don't have the refinery capacity. They import nearly half of the gasoline they burn. If the United Nations would prohibit every country in the world from sending them that refined petroleum, you would have an immediate impact on the streets of Tehran. You would be able then to turn to the Iranian people, to turn to the Iranian elites and say that you, indeed, face economic and diplomatic isolation unless you abandon your nuclear weapons program. We need to prioritize. We need to link what is important to us to what is important to others. We need to use all the tools in our toolbox, and we need to use them immediately. Otherwise, we will not achieve the level of security from nuclear attack that the American people deserve. I am not saying that we can make America invulnerable, but I am saying that it is our duty here in the Federal Government and as foreign policymakers to do everything we can to achieve that objective. I have concluded. I did mention that I would perhaps talk about threats that face us in the second and third quarters of the 21st century. I will leave that to another speech. I yield back.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, the facts are these: Homeowners have signed mortgages where they can't afford to make the payments, especially as they are adjusted upwards. We need to write-down the principal amount to something that these good homeowners can afford. But we are told ``don't bail out the lenders.'' There are two ways to write-down the principal amount of a loan: an involuntary way through the bankruptcy court, and we had a bill before this House which authorized the bankruptcy court in very limited circumstances, very tailored, to write-down the balance of the loan. Don't bail out the lender, just tell the lender they have to take less. That bill is not going to pass. It is opposed by Republicans in the Senate. The second way is a voluntary way. You make a fair offer to the lender that, if they will write-down the principal amount, then they will get a guarantee of that lesser amount from the government--so at least they will get paid something. Now we are told to vote against this bill because it bails out lenders. Some are giving hypocrisy a bad name. If you are going to help homeowners, you have to write-down the balance of the loan. And people come to this floor and they say well, we can't do it the voluntary way, and we can't do it the involuntary way; but just as soon as we find some other way, they will be happy to bail out homeowners. The fact is they have voted against using the bankruptcy court to write- down the principal amount and not give the lenders anything. And now they are saying when we make a fair offer to the lenders to do the same thing, we are bailing out the lenders. I have a lot of ``respect'' for anybody who can come to this floor and just say they don't want to help these homeowners at all. That's an honest position. But to say you are against the voluntary and involuntary, that's wrong.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor and congratulate my dear friends Rita and Jack Sinder for their invaluable and outstanding service to Valley Beth Shalom Temple. Jack and Rita have been two of the most productive members of the Valley Beth Shalom community, bringing guidance, spirituality and joy to the congregation. Jack, a former bond chair for the State of Israel Bonds, served as construction chair for the synagogue during its expansion in 1986. As construction chair, Jack planned and oversaw construction of the sanctuary, classrooms, administrative offices, chapel and the parking center. The parking center is now dedicated to the Sinders. Rita is a past president of the San Fernando Valley's Women Division of Israel Bonds and a past president of the Women's Alliance for Israel, and she continues to serve on its executive board. Jack and Rita are also founding members of the American Jewish University Wagner Program and patrons of the Wiesenthal Center. Valley Beth Shalom continues to make extraordinary contributions to the San Fernando Valley through innovative programs that promote tolerance, increase learning, develop leadership skills, and foster social justice. Valley Beth Shalom has demonstrated a longstanding commitment to developing the community's understanding of the connection between religion and education. The temple empowers individuals, allowing their voices to be heard in our community and around the world. Madam Speaker, I am proud to recognize Jack and Rita Sinder for their outstanding service to the Valley Beth Shalom community.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, today I rise to commend and congratulate an outstanding California teacher, Lewis Chappelear, for being named a finalist for the National Teacher of the Year award. Mr. Chappelear is an accomplished scholar, receiving his Bachelor of Science degree in biomedical engineering from Boston University in 1994, a Master of Science degree in mechanical engineering from Columbia University in 1995, and a California Clear Teaching Credential in math, physics, and electronics in 2001. He received a National Board Certification in 2005. Highly praised by both his students and the community, he has received several awards including: Los Angeles Unified School District, LAUSD, Teacher of the Year, Los Angeles County Teacher of the Year, and California Teacher of the Year, and is California's nominee for the National Teacher of the Year Award. Most importantly, Mr. Chappelear is a renowned teacher. He developed Monroe's School of Engineering and Design--an extremely successful hands-on learning environment which has received several prestigious awards. The school's mission is to prepare students for hightech jobs by placing students in internships through collaboration with local organizations and businesses. Students work on projects related to careers in engineering and jobs skills such as how to write a resume or business letter. He encourages learning by incorporating the most recent computer software and technology into his classroom lectures in a way that inspires all of his students. Realizing that robotics is one of the most effective ways to teach science and math, Mr. Chappelear has recruited and trained teachers from all over California to begin similar robotics programs. In 2007, his students took first place in a regional robotics championship held at California State University, Northridge. Mr. Chappelear's work extends beyond the classroom. After noticing that students in his classes were having problems with drugs and alcohol, he facilitated groups to help students during his breaks. He considers himself an important part of the community: His students are his family. His philosophy on teaching is to make emotional connections with each student and to make their learning relevant. He believes that everything in the classroom should be interdisciplinary. In his words, ``I am not just an Engineering and Design teacher * * * I am also a mentor, a guide and a critical link in my students' lives.'' He feels that student achievement is based in rigor, relevance and relationships. Madam Speaker, I am proud to recognize Lewis Chappelear as a finalist for the National Teacher of the Year award. I am truly honored to pay tribute to this outstanding teacher.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Thank you. Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor to focus on an issue that I have been discussing with my colleagues for almost a decade and that I have brought to this floor several times since the year 2000. That is an issue I call ``engineered intelligence.'' By that, I mean the efforts of computer engineers to develop computers with intelligence that far exceeds that of the normal human being and, likewise, the efforts of biological engineers to create either intelligence enhanced forms of human beings, or new life forms that have intelligence far beyond that of the average human. Mr. Speaker, I believe that science will have a greater impact on the coming century than it has had in the last several centuries, knowing full well of the enormous impact that science has had in the last 100 and 200 years. As one futurist points out, if someone describes the future 40 years from now and paints a picture that looks like a science fiction movie, that picture may be wrong, but if someone is discussing the future 40 years from now and paints a picture that does not look like a science fiction movie, then you know they are wrong. We will be living in a science fiction movie. We just don't know which one. I believe that the issue of engineered intelligence is one that will have a greater impact on humankind than even the development of nuclear weapons. Just a few years before nuclear weapons were first exploded, Albert Einstein wrote to Roosevelt, and explained that it was possible to create such a nuclear bomb. In fact, just a few years went by before it was a reality. Now we have not a few years, but a few decades, to wrestle with the enormous ethical, theological and sociological impacts of the technologies that are out there--just 10, 20, 30 years away. My fear is that we will over the next 10 years do what we have done over the last 10 years: Basically, waste the time that we so urgently need to deal with issues that we have just begun, that we really have not begun, to think through. Now, as we develop more intelligent computers, we will find them useful tools in creating even more intelligent computers, a positive feedback loop. I don't know whether we will create the maniacal Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey or the earnest Data from Star Trek. My guess is that we will create them both. There are those who say don't worry because even the most intelligent or malevolent computer is in a box, and cannot affect the outside world. But I believe there are those of the human species who would give hands to the devil, in return for a good stock tip. I do draw solace from the fact that because a computer is intelligent or even self-aware, that this does not mean that it is ambitious. That is, will it try to affect the outside world? Will it have a survival instinct? My washing machine does not seem to care whether I turn it off or not. In contrast, my pet mouse does seem to care. We should be working on elements to implant in computers to prevent self-awareness, survival instinct and ambition. But I know no politician is supposed to say that, because it sounds wacky; it sounds like science fiction. But if we are not talking about things that sound like science fiction, then we are not talking about the real issues that will confront us in the generation to come. We also should focus not only on computer engineering but on the engineering of DNA. Biological engineering starts with an inherently ambitious raw material. Virtually all life forms seem to seek to survive, seem to try to affect their environment to achieve that purpose. Most of them seem to care whether their progeny survive. Now, bioengineers could create a 1,000-pound mammal with a 100-pound brain that will beat your kids on the LSAT. These are issues that deserve the attention of all of us in the public sphere but particularly those who are our best philosophers, theologians and sociologists. I thank the Chair for giving me the time to, once again, bring these issues before the House, and I look forward to working with my colleagues to see that these issues are confronted long before science confronts us with new reality. I believe that the impact of science on this century will be far greater than the enormous impact science had on the last century. As futurist Christine Peterson notes: If someone is describing the future 30 years from now and they paint a picture that seems like it is from a science fiction movie, then they might be wrong. But, if someone is describing the future a generation from now and they paint a picture that doesn't look like a science fiction movie, then you know they are wrong. We are going to live in a science fiction movie, we just don't know which one. There is one issue that I think is more explosive than even the spread of nuclear weapons: engineered intelligence. I have spent nine years focused on this issue \1\ By ``engineered intelligence'' I mean the efforts of computer engineers and bio-engineers who may create intelligence beyond that of a human being. In testimony at the House Science Committee,\2\ the consensus of experts testifying was that in roughly 25 years we would have a computer that passed the Turing Test,\3\ and more importantly exceeded human intelligence. As we develop more intelligent computers, we will find them useful tools in creating ever more intelligent computers, a positive feedback loop. I don't know whether we will be creating the maniacal Hal from 2001, or the earnest Data from Star Trek--or perhaps both. There are those who say don't worry, even if a computer is intelligent and malevolent--it is in a box and it cannot affect the world. But I believe that there are those of our species who would give hands to the devil, in return for a good stock tip. I do draw solace from the fact that just because a computer is intelligent, or even self-aware, this does not mean that it is ambitious. By ambitious, I mean possessing a survival instinct together with a desire to affect the environment so as to ensure survival, and usually a desire to propagate or expand. My washing machine does not seem to care whether I turn it off or not. My pet mouse does seem to care. So even a computer possessing great intelligence may simply have no ambition, survival instinct, or interest in affecting the world. DARPA \4\ is the government agency on the cutting edge of supercomputer research. I have urged DARPA to develop computer systems designed to maximize the computer's utility, while avoiding self- awareness, or at least ambition. I have spoken about computer engineering. But there is a whole different area of engineering: bio-engineering. Roughly 30 or 40 years from now bio-engineers should be able to start with human DNA and create a 2,000 pound mammal with a 300 pound brain designed to beat your grandkids on the LSAT. No less troubling, they might start with canine DNA and create a mammal with near-human intelligence, and no civil rights. DNA is inherently ambitious. Those microbes which didn't seek to survive or replicate, didn't. Even birds seem to care whether they or their progeny survive, and they seek to affect their environment to achieve that survival. In any case, you have the bio-engineers and the computer engineers both working toward new levels of intelligence. I believe in our lifetime we will see new species possessing intelligence which surpasses our own. The last time a new higher level of intelligence arose on this planet was roughly 50,000 years ago. It was our own ancestors, who then said hello to the previously most intelligent species, Neanderthals. It did not work out so well for the Neanderthals. I used to view this as a contest between the bio-engineers and the computer engineers (or if you use the cool new lingo, wet nanotechnology and dry nanotechnology), in an effort to develop a new species of superior intelligence. I felt that the last decision that humans would make is whether our successors are carbon-based or silicon- based: \5\ the product of bio-engineering or of computer engineering. Now I believe we are most likely to see combinations that will involve nature, computer engineering, and bio-engineering: humans with pharmaceutical intelligence boosters; DNA enhancements; computer-chip implants; or all three. First, this will be used to cure disease, then to enhance human capacity. The partially-human will precede the trans- human. Now how should we react to all of this? It is important that we benefit from science even as we consider its more troubling implications. I chair the House Subcommittee on Nonproliferation which deals with the only other technologies that pose an existential threat to humankind, namely the proliferation of nuclear and biological weapons. The history of nuclear technology is instructive. On August 2, 1939, Einstein sent Roosevelt a letter saying a nuclear weapon was possible; six years later, nuclear technology literally exploded onto the world scene. Only after society saw the negative effects of nuclear technology, did we see the prospects for nuclear power and nuclear medicine. The future of engineered intelligence will be different. The undeniable benefits of computer and DNA research will arrive long before the problematic possibilities. Their introduction will be gradual, not explosive. And fortunately, we will have far more than six years to consider the implications--unless we choose to squander the next few decades. My fear is that our philosophers, ethicists and society at large, will ignore the issues that will inevitably present themselves until . . . they actually present themselves. And these issues require more than a few years of thought.\6\ I have been urged not to make this issue the centerpiece of my reelection campaign. One journalist has told me that he can guarantee that computers will not be self-aware or overly intelligent: ``All we have to do is get them elected to Congress.'' I am confident that if we plan ahead we can obtain the utility of supercomputers, and the medical treatments available from bio- engineering, without creating new levels of intelligence. We can then pause and decide whether we in fact wish to create a new intelligent species or two. Finally, I would quote Oliver Wendell Holmes in 1913 when he said, ``I think it not improbable that man, like the grub that prepares a chamber for the winged thing it never has seen but is to be--that man may have cosmic destinies that he does not understand.'' \7\ Likewise, it is possible that within the next 30 or 40 years, our children--or should I say ``our successors''--will have less resemblance to us than a butterfly has to a caterpillar. I don't know whether to cry or rejoice, but I do know that our best minds in philosophy, science, ethics and even theology ought to be focused on this issue.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to an extraordinary public servant dedicated to promoting the intellectual, economic and cultural contributions of the San Fernando Valley, California State University, Northridge President Jolene Koester. This year, the Encino-Tarzana Hospital Charitable Foundation is honoring Dr. Koester with the Tree of Life Award for her educational and civic contributions. As a visionary leader in the San Fernando Valley, Dr. Koester has transformed California State University, Northridge into one of the State's premier higher education institutions. CSUN is a vibrant, diverse and accessible university community of nearly 34,000 students and more than 4,000 faculty and staff. This year, CSUN will celebrate its 50th anniversary as the only public university located in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley--home to about 1.8 million residents. Dr. Koester began her appointment as the fourth president of California State University, Northridge on July 1, 2000. Prior to her appointment, Dr. Koester served as provost and vice president for Academic Affairs at California State University, Sacramento. She earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Minnesota, a Master of Arts in communication arts from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a Ph.D. in speech communication from Minnesota. An active member of the community, Dr. Koester has served on the boards of directors for the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, the Economic Alliance of the San Fernando Valley, the Valley Industry & Commerce Association, the Southern California Biomedical Council, and the Los Angeles Economy & Jobs Committee. Dr. Koester is a recognized leader in higher education in the State of California, and has received numerous civic and business awards for her commitment to furthering the excellence of California State University, Northridge. Dr. Koester was recently appointed as Chair-Elect of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities. As Chair-Elect of one of the country's most prestigious higher education advocacy organizations, she will have the unique opportunity to represent over three million students at 430 public colleges and universities. Moreover, she will advocate on behalf of the association in support of public policies extending higher education to underrepresented and first-generation college students throughout the country. Madam Speaker, I wish to extend my heartfelt congratulations to Dr. Jolene Koester for receiving the Tree of Life Award from the Encino- Tarzana Hospital Charitable Foundation. Dr. Koester has exhibited strong leadership skills and a commitment to education that will benefit California State University, Northridge, the San Fernando Valley and the Los Angeles region for years to come.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, we're all deeply saddened by the passing of Tom Lantos. He not only made history here in Washington; he embodied history, having survived the Holocaust. And he didn't just survive the Nazis; he fought them in the anti-Nazi underground during World War II. His personal history added to the gravitas of everything he said and everything he did here in Washington. Tom was our Nation's most passionate, eloquent, and respected advocate for human rights, for democracy and for freedom. Tom never bowed to political pressure in the face of any humanitarian atrocity. As our friend, Gary Ackerman, pointed out, in a town with too many sheep, Tom Lantos was a lion, for Darfur, for Tibet, wherever human rights were trampled. And of course Tom Lantos led the walk out in 2001 from the Durban South Africa U.N. conference when that conference degenerated into an anti-Semitic hatefest. Madam Speaker, I came here as a tax professional expecting to serve on the Ways and Means Committee someday. And when that day arrived, Tom Lantos convinced me to stay involved instead on the Foreign Affairs Committee. He convinced me with his words, but more than that he convinced me with his example. He was courteous, gracious, beyond what you expect; but more than that, he was passionate and he was eloquent. And he was an example of what it is to be a great advocate for human rights here in Congress. He will indeed be missed, not only by Annette and the entire Lantos family, but also by people around the world.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I have heard a lot of folks talk about the substance of this agreement. They started reading the agreement at the front. They saw the substance. They see the labor and the environmental standards. I think they are reading it in the wrong way. With an agreement like this, you need to start reading it from the back where the enforcement provisions are supposed to be. So let us test the enforcement mechanisms in this agreement. Let me put forth an extreme possibility, an extreme example. Let's say there is a military coup in Peru. Let's say the junta is rounding up labor leaders. Let's say they start executing those labor leaders, God forbid. Let's say they televise those executions and they are being conducted by the head of the junta himself. What enforcement is there in this agreement? Only so much as George Bush decides to have. If he chooses to do nothing, then no action by any court of this country, no private action, no act by this Congress will be of any effect. In contrast, importers will have an absolute right to enforce their rights to low tariffs on the Peruvian goods they bring into this country because if the tariff is lower, no customs agent of the United States could try to collect a higher amount. President Bush has never inconvenienced a multinational corporation. When in Guatemala, labor leaders like Marco Ramirez and Pedro Zamora were killed, President Bush did nothing. When dozens and more, scores of labor leaders in Colombia are killed, President Bush tells us we should have a free trade agreement. The only provisions in this agreement that provide for enforcement can be nullified at the whim of a man who has no intention of enforcing this agreement. If you vote for this agreement, it's because you have faith in George Bush to enforce it.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of TAA assistance and therefore oppose this weakening amendment. But we should recognize that TAA is a Band-Aid on a self-inflicted wound. Our trade policies are gutting the American economy far beyond the ability of TAA to ameliorate the pain. What is obvious is the loss of individual industrial plants. What is less visible is the increase in our interest rates and a decline in our national industrial base. Today, let us adopt the Band-Aid, but let us not use the presence of those Band-Aids as an excuse for further self-inflicted wounds. Today, we should pass TAA. Tomorrow, let us stop the bleeding. Let us not adopt trade agreements that increase our trade deficit. And let us begin to renegotiate existing trade agreements so that they are based on results rather than based on form. Let us build an economy where demand for labor is so high that instead of hearing stories of pain from workers, we are hearing from employers fighting for every available employee. Let us hear of a dollar that is more valuable than the Euro and let us have a trade policy that for every dollar of imports, we match it with a dollar of exports. Until then, there are workers who are in pain, who are casualties of our ill-conceived trade policies. They need and deserve our help.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, because I was unavoidably detained, I was not able to vote on passage of H.R. 2102 (rollcall No. 973). Had I been present for the vote, I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Madam Speaker, I rise to recognize Rabbi Mark Stephen Miller, in honor of his 60th birthday, which occurred on October 5, 2007. For over 30 years, Rabbi Miller has served his Newport Beach congregation, Temple Bat Yahm, with distinction, setting a standard of excellence as a teacher, counselor, and spiritual leader. Rabbi Miller has worked tirelessly to promote tolerance and understanding, and he continues to be an exceptional role model for young people. I consider myself fortunate to have been the benefactor of Rabbi Miller's kind heart and understanding and my family remain proud members of his congregation. I am also thankful that Rabbi Miller was able to participate in my wedding ceremony. Rabbi Miller was ordained from Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati in 1974, and in 1999 he received an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Hebrew Union College. He joined Temple Bat Yahm in 1977 as its rabbi following a short time as assistant rabbi at Temple Sinai in Roslyn Heights, New York where he met his bride of 30 years, Wendy. Together they raised five wonderful children. During his tenure at Temple Bat Yahm the congregation has grown from one hundred plus families to approximately six hundred families, and its facility has moved from a one room portable classroom to a sprawling campus which includes a beautiful sanctuary, classrooms, social halls, an intimate chapel and a wonderful amphitheatre for outdoor services. Rabbi Miller is a renowned lecturer on business ethics, bioethics, tolerance and interfaith relations. He spent over 20 years as a guest lecturer at University of California, Irvine and now teaches regularly at Chapman University. His commanding presence on the pulpit and dramatic storytelling and lecturing style is well known and respected. Rabbi Miller has been recognized by the United States Congress before. He has given the invocation to both the House of Representatives and the Senate, where he once served as an aide to Senator Walter Mondale. An avid baseball fan and diehard Chicago Cubs fan, Rabbi Miller was similarly honored by also giving the invocation at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY for its annual induction ceremony. It is most fitting that he was born on the same day as one of baseball's most remembered plays, Al Gionfriddo's game-saving World Series catch. Madam Speaker, please join me in recognizing Rabbi Mark Stephen Miller on this significant birthday and for his many years of dedicated service to his family, congregation, community and faith. He is a shining light to us all.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 564) recognizing that violence poses an increasingly serious threat to peace and stability in Central America and supporting expanded cooperation between the United States and the countries of Central America to combat crime and violence, as amended.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this bill, and yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, IEEPA, has over the years enabled the United States on various occasions to impose significant economic sanctions and limitations on terrorists, terrorist groups and their supporters, on financiers and on some of the worst rogue regimes in the world. It has allowed three Presidents to keep the U.S. dual-use export control system in operation against the efforts of states like Iran and North Korea to require sensitive dual- use technology and equipment. IEEPA has accomplished this goal, even though Congress has been unable to reauthorize the long-expired Export Administration Act, and I hope that later in this Congress we do reauthorize the Export Administration Act. That act was the original basis for the system of export control which is now handled through IEEPA. Immediately after 9/11, IEEPA authority was used to freeze the assets of terrorist, terrorist organizations and their supporters and to hobble the international terrorist network that sought and still seeks to kill and maim innocent Americans. Yet the penalties for violating IEEPA's provisions are lighter than they should be. Send $1 million as a gift to Osama bin Laden and you get as a maximum penalty a $50,000 fine and 10 years in prison under the act. The same is true for unlawful exports of sensitive commercial technology, equipment and components that have military applications that are controlled for national security purposes. If you send a milling machine for shaping nuclear warhead cores to either Iran or North Korea, the same maximum fine and prison terms under the act apply. This bill increases the penalties to a level that I think is consistent with the importance of making sure that Americans do not, whether for ideological reasons or financial gain, deliberately violate our efforts to control terrorism and to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction. S. 1612 increases civil penalties from $50,000 up to $250,000, or to an amount that is twice the amount of the transaction that is the basis of the violation with respect to which the penalty is imposed. It also increases criminal penalties for willful violations from $50,000 up to $1 million and/or imprisonment for not more than 20 years. This increase in penalties is appropriate given the importance of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to our national security. I urge my colleagues to support this bill. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the resolution under consideration.

Mr. SHERMAN

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the resolution under consideration.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 203) condemning the persecution of labor rights advocates in Iran, as amended.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this resolution and yield myself such time as I may consume. I would like to thank our colleagues, Mr. Kirk from Illinois, Mr. Andrews from New Jersey, for introducing this important and timely legislation. Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons in support of terrorism and its abuse of the human rights of its own people collectively form one of the most serious threats to peace and freedom faced by our country and faced by the world. It speaks volumes that Iran is a member of the International Labor Organization and formally subscribes to the core ILO principles like freedom of association, yet continues to jail those who attempt to form independent labor unions. The mistreatment of two courageous labor leaders, Mr. Mahmoud Salehi and Mansour Osanloo, is yet another example of the unacceptable behavior of the regime in Iran. Since 2004, Mahmoud Salehi, who comes from the Kurdish region of Iran, has been jailed on trumped-up charges for the crime of trying to organize a May Day rally in his own city. Unlike many well-known Iranian dissidents, Mr. Salehi is not a writer or a professor or even a politician. He is an ordinary man, a baker by trade, who has had the courage to stand up for the rights of working people. Since April 19 of this year, he has been imprisoned and denied access to the dialysis treatments he requires. The same is true of Mansour Osanloo, who fell afoul of the regime for threatening in 2006 to lead his fellow bus drivers in Tehran out on strike. Mr. Osanloo was kidnapped from his bus by unknown parties and severely beaten. He too is now being held on vaguely worded charges. It is appropriate and necessary for the United States House of Representatives to condemn the brutal mistreatment of these leaders and call for their immediate release. I strongly support this resolution, and I encourage all my colleagues to do likewise. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to yield 3 minutes to the coauthor of this legislation, the chairman of the Education and Labor Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions, the very distinguished Mr. Andrews from New Jersey.